Six months
I'm out here in the tent with Bea curled up behind my legs with her head on my hip, listening to strange night birds and coyotes and the wind, wide awake and so full of emotion - happiness and something else - and finally realizing why I can't sleep.
I knew that tomorrow was going to be the six-month anniversary of Tater's death ... But it didn't occur to me until just now that this night is also an anniversary, of the last night of his life. I stayed awake with him off and on all night listening to him breathe and cry and try to get comfortable, knowing that in a few hours he would be gone.
I don't know why I never thought to mention that this tent where I've been sleeping for so many months is only a few yards away from where we buried him.
In fact, the whole reason for the tent in the first place was supposed to be so I could sleep with him outside, so he wouldn't have to negotiate the dog door alone at night. I thought the tent would be easier, and spare him the indignity of possibly not making it outside in time as his legs got weaker. Mr. A got it out of storage for me before he left on his LA trip, but Tater died before I got a chance to use it.
It sat on the back porch next to the dog door for three months. Then one night I was feeling hot and irritable and in need of space, so I finally set it up. And have been sleeping in it ever since, between my two dogs - one in the ground under the trees, and the other keeping me warm and guarding my door.
I still can't seem to believe he's really gone ... So in a weird way I'm grateful for that awful/aweful night, because my memory of it helps me feel more grounded in the knowledge that it really did happen. He really died, and I really will not be seeing him again. Although sometimes I'm not sure it's all that great to know that, to Know that I know it.
This grieving experience continues to grow the capacity of my heart to open wider than I ever would have thought it could. Death is more real to me now and it hurts when I think about it - which I don't make a point of doing - but when it does come up, like tonight, I try to let it be.
I feel like I want to stay awake all night with him again.
Will he still be here tomorrow? Or will he be gone again, for good?
I knew that tomorrow was going to be the six-month anniversary of Tater's death ... But it didn't occur to me until just now that this night is also an anniversary, of the last night of his life. I stayed awake with him off and on all night listening to him breathe and cry and try to get comfortable, knowing that in a few hours he would be gone.
I don't know why I never thought to mention that this tent where I've been sleeping for so many months is only a few yards away from where we buried him.
In fact, the whole reason for the tent in the first place was supposed to be so I could sleep with him outside, so he wouldn't have to negotiate the dog door alone at night. I thought the tent would be easier, and spare him the indignity of possibly not making it outside in time as his legs got weaker. Mr. A got it out of storage for me before he left on his LA trip, but Tater died before I got a chance to use it.
It sat on the back porch next to the dog door for three months. Then one night I was feeling hot and irritable and in need of space, so I finally set it up. And have been sleeping in it ever since, between my two dogs - one in the ground under the trees, and the other keeping me warm and guarding my door.
I still can't seem to believe he's really gone ... So in a weird way I'm grateful for that awful/aweful night, because my memory of it helps me feel more grounded in the knowledge that it really did happen. He really died, and I really will not be seeing him again. Although sometimes I'm not sure it's all that great to know that, to Know that I know it.
This grieving experience continues to grow the capacity of my heart to open wider than I ever would have thought it could. Death is more real to me now and it hurts when I think about it - which I don't make a point of doing - but when it does come up, like tonight, I try to let it be.
I feel like I want to stay awake all night with him again.
Will he still be here tomorrow? Or will he be gone again, for good?
